ASRock’s Z87 Motherboards Unveiled!

We showed you ASUS’s Z87 lineup just the other day and today we have ASRock’s Z87 lineup for you. It looks like ASRock will have a nice set of Haswell boards on launch including overclocking, gaming and mainstream offerings. Just like previous generations they have partnered with Fatal1ty and has specific Fatal1ty boards a well. Read on to see all of ASRock’s upcoming Z87 boards as this is quite a large post!

ASRock’s Z87 Motherboards Unveiled

ASRock will have three separate tiers for their Z87 motherboards, they include Z87 Formula, Z87 FATAL1TY and Z87 Extreme. Each tier has a line of motherboards with specific features. Let’s start with the FATAL1TY lineup.

ASRock Z87 Professional

The ASRock Z87 Professional is a high-end motherboard that keeps the same black and red color scheme that we have seen on previous Fatal1ty-branded boards before. Expansion slots include three PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots, a single PCI Express 3.0 x1 slot and two legacy PCI slots. For storage you have 10 SATA 6 GB/s ports. 8.1 channel audio is provided by Sound Core 3D. There is also many USB 3.0 ports, dual Gigabit and a mPCI Express slot that can support mSATA SSDs or WiFi cards.

ASRock H87 Performance

The ASRock H87 still falls under the Fatal1ty tier, but is more budget friendly. Expansion slots are made up of two PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots, two PCI Express 3.0 x1 slots and three PCI slots. You have six SATA 6 GB/s ports and for output there are VGA, DVI and HDMI outputs for the 4th generation Intel HD Graphics. High quality audio is provided by ASRock’s A-PureStyle audio chip.

Next we have the Formula tier, which is made for overclocking. It will include 3 motherboards: Z87 OC Formula/ac, Z87 OC Formula and Z87M OC Formula.

ASRock Z87 OC Formula/AC

Just like the previous OC Formula boards the Z87 OC Formula will keep the same black and yellow color scheme. It will also have a hybrid (air & water) cooling solution that sits on the electrical components. These boards also make use of High C-Caps and a digital PWM design. The Z87 OC Formula comes with an awesome Debug LED system that actually shows CPU temperature and voltage right on the board! Overclocking options also include dual voltage measurement points and OC switches. Expansion slots include four PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots and two PCI Express 3.0 x1 slots. You also have 10 SATA 6GB/s ports for storage and a mPCI Express slot. The main difference between the Z87 OC Formula/AC and the Z87 OC Formula is the /AC model comes with an integrated 802.11ac networking.

ASRock Z87M OC Formula

Of course ASRock would have a micro-ATX version of the larger OC Formula board. This smaller board does not have the hybrid cooling solution, rather a large heatpipe solution. It will have two PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots, a single PCI Express 3.0 x4 slot and a single PCI Express 3.0 x1 slot. It uses a normal debug LED, not the awesome one that is on the larger boards. For audio ASRock is using their own Purity sound chip.

The Extreme tier will hold 5 boards to start: Z87 Extreme 11, Z87 Extreme 9, Z87 Extreme 6, Z87 Extreme 4 and Z87 Extreme M4. We do have information on some of those boards.

ASRock Z87 Extreme 9/AC

The Extreme series uses the same matte black finish as on previous Extreme models. ASRock is using very large and attractive heatpipe cooling solutions on the Z87 Extreme 9. It makes use of five PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots, and a single PCI Express 3.0 x1 slot. For storage you have 10 SATA 6 GB/s ports. You will also have dual Thunderbolt ports, HDMI, DisplayPort and several USB 3.0 ports.

ASRock Z87 Extreme 6

The Z87 Extreme six is more budget friendly and features a more basic design. The features set is still not bad: three PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots, one PCI Express 3.0 x1 slot, two PCI slots, 10 SATA 3 ports, and onboard WiFi.

ASRock Z87 Extreme 4

It looks like there is already a review of this board online. But it is the more mainstream board. The Z87 Extreme M4 will be the micro-ATX version of this board.